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Natalie is enjoying Oklahoma!
The problem many theatre-goers have with Oklahoma! is that after a man is killed on stage, his body is metaphorically swept under the carpet and the company bursts into happy song.
But Natalie Casey, who has the principal comic role of Ado Annie in the current Chichester Festival Theatre production, believes Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote an upbeat ending only because it was demanded during the second world war.
'Perhaps they were taking the mickey out of American audiences, saying "Look how stupid you are." What has happened will haunt Curley and Laurey's married life for ever.'
Certainly, says Natalie, the mood in the CFT production is not 'Oops, never mind!'
Contrary to this reviewer's first-night perception, Jud Fry does not begin the singing of Oh What a Beautiful Mornin'. Although he is (unusually) on stage, the song is initially sung off-stage by Curley as scripted.
But the point stands that Jud is humanised in a production that is darker than usual, and Curley's taunting demand that he kill himself is given real viciousness.
Natalie is notably impressed by that. So although she remains at 29 very much a bubbly Lancashire lass, she is clearly not Carol Groves - 'the ditzy, crazy character' she played in Hollyoaks for three years before leaving to perform in Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps.
'It was too good an opportunity to refuse,' she says, 'and luckily it was the right decision. Hollyoaks is brilliant but it's a teen soap and when you're gettting towards 20 it's time to move on.'
She finished filming a series of Two Pints in March and will spend three or four months on another series next year.
That arrangement is good, she says, because it allows her to spend time in theatre. It had always been her intention to go into musicals, as her sister Anna-Jane Casey had already done with huge success, and
Natalie has previously been in The Wedding Singer and Fame.
Now she would like to return to CFT, with its audience on three sides of the stage.
'All theatres should be like this,' she says. 'The conventional proscenium arch is so bizarre. This is much more realistic, much more akin to how you behave in life.'
*Oklahoma! continues in repertoire until August 29. Tickets: (013243) 781312 or cft.org.uk.
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Wednesday 23 May 2012
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